Update...1.5 weeks of work...

I’ll preface this post by saying that this was a pretty boring week, filled with lots of work. Also, this week has been filled with lots of work, so this post will be relatively short, bc I don’t have the time to make it longer…Oh, and I didn’t mention anything about the weather because it’s been 60 degrees and sunny for over a week. I love Paris in the springtime :-).

Dimanche, le 4 mars

Slept in til noon, went running. After a quick shower, I went to meet Sara and Darcy at Notre Dame. All national monuments and museums are free on the first Sunday of every month, and we decided that “il faut profiter” (the French love saying “profiter de” – it might be the most commonly used phrase after… “oh la” (and all variations on that) and “truc”). The line for the Notre Dame towers was insane, so we walked to the Pantheon and checked out Foucault’s pendulum, and looooots of tombeaux. After the Pantheon, we bought apples from a marche, and ate them by the Seine. We talked for a while, then headed home.

Dinner = crepe night! It was out of control. There were lots of people: Constance and her fiancé, Pauline and her boyfriend, Madame, Monsieur, et moi. We made loooots of crepes salees, and sucres. And it took a lifetime (think over 2 hours). Anyway, it was delicious, and after we finally finished (11:30pm), I went to bed.

Lundi, le 5 mars

Viola lesson at 9am, which was good, despite the fact that I hadn’t practiced in a week. Came home, ran, went to one of my favorite boulangeries by Hotel des Invalides, and did work all afternoon.

Mardi, le 6 mars

TD in the morning – learned about Manet, and a girl gave a really awful expose, which Madame ripped apart. It was clear the girl hadn’t put much effort into the expose, but we (the American students) felt bad for her nonetheless…Madame basically told her that everything she said was wrong, and that she was stupid.

After TD I had Atelier d’Ecriture, where we did a lot with bon/bien, meilleur/mieux, which will always haunt me. After Atelier I just worked all afternoon on my expose on Saint-Sulpice, came home, had dinner, did work, and went to bed.

Mercredi, le 7 mars

Had monuments class, where we learned about Louis XIV, and visited Hotel des Invalides in the afternoon. After class, I went back to the boulangerie with Darcy, and we met our friend Sam from Williams (it was her birthday while we were in Prague, so we had pastries and chatted). After that, I went running, then came home, had dinner, and worked on my Atelier essay due the next day.

Jeudi, le 8 mars

Atelier in the morning – sentir vs se sentir, changer de, and some stuff on pronominal verbs. Impressionism class at the Sorbonne was cancelled, so after class I went shopping with Darcy, and got a guide book on Italy! It’s written in French, so I can even practice my French while preparing for my trip!

Came home, ran, had dinner, and went out to Café Oz with Sara, Claire, and Kate. It was lots of fun, but we were all a little beat, and decided to make it an early night, so we caught the last metro.

Vendredi, le 9 mars

Renaissance class in the morning – learned about Masaccio, and Florentine painting. After class, I met up with Darcy, and we got our hair cut! It was actually pretty scary – I mean, where do you learn the vocab necessary for a hair salon? My hair dresser was also kind of a creep/flirt, so I wanted to run away from him. Buuut now my hair is short, and layered…and I like it! Except that I can’t put it up in a ponytail while running.

After haircuts, we went to the Louvre (what else do you do on Friday afternoons anyway?), and braved the crowds in the Grand Gallery.

After a good 2 hours of culture, we decided to go to Café Flores for our Friday kirs and people-watching. I came home & had a speedy dinner with my host family (they went to see a movie early), and met my friends Marie and Liz (who live nearby) at the Cristal. The Cristal was…insane. I walked in, and saw Antoine, Vincent, Antoine’s brother, Marco, “Rock & Roll Alex,” and the rest of those guys. It was pretty crazy, but fun to see them again. After an hour at the Cristal, I met up with Darcy and we went out to the Bastille. On the metro ride back we met these ridiculous British guys who kept talking to us about the France-England Rugby tournament, and then lots of American students…it was a pretty memorable ride on line 1.

Samedi, le 10 mars

Woke up, went running, then Darcy and I went to the 16^th to see Le Corbusier’s Villa Roche. After that, we went to the Bois de Boulogne, one of my new favorite spots in Paris. It looks like it comes straight out of an Impressionist painting – a lake with people going on row-boat rides, two islands, people lying in the grass, picnicking, playing guitar, etc. We hung out there for the day, walked around, and read.

Came home, changed, met up with Darcy, and 3 girls who study in Aix but were in Paris for the weekend (they’re friends with one of Darcy’s best friends at Williams). We had an early dinner in the Latin Quarter, then I met my friend Antoine at Odeon for drinks.

Dimanche, le 11 mars

Met up with Darcy and Ale in the Jardin du Luxembourg for a picnic and a “recap” session on all the crazy events of the weekend. After that, I walked around by myself in the Marais and around there for a few hours, then met up again with Darcy & Ale, and the girls from Aix. We went to a hookah bar in the 5^th, then I went home for dinner. They went to dinner in Montmartre, so I metro-ed out there after my dinner and hung out with them. We were hit on by the ridiculous waiters wearing berets, and were pretty glad to leave at the end of the night (though, of course, the waiters followed us out of the restaurant and asked us to come out with them…on a Sunday…oh France.)

Lundi, le 12 mars

Pas de grande chose. Woke up, ran, headed to Centre Pompidou. Had lunch outside, then went inside for the afternoon, and did work. One exciting thing – Paris is a small city. I mean super-small. That’s been the theme of the past 2 weeks. I haven’t really mentioned any of the other stories that have led me to this conclusion (but there are about 1000 of them – I’ve been having around 3 awkward/random encounters a day for the past 2 weeks). But this one is funny. Well basically, we saw a guy that Darcy has a date with tonight (Wednesday) in the library. And she freaked out and hid behind her computer all day. It was even better because he had texted her like half-an-hour earlier, aka when he was in the library. It was just amazing, because that’s the sort of thing that happens at Williams – lots of awkward encounters…you’d think you’d be safe in a big city. But Paris is not as big as it seems!

Anyway Darcy was freaking out, so we left around 5, and drank kirs while people-watching.

Mardi, le 13 mars

TD in the morning – learned about Donatello. Then had TD where we did more with etre/avoir and passé compose. After TD I had a meeting with the art history advisor at Sweet Briar, and picked out my paper topics for my 2 20-pg dossiers due in May. I did work at SB until it closed, came home and ran. Dinner with the host fam, then went out to Cristal for a bit with Sara, Kate, and Claire, which was fun – we ran into another friend from Sweet Briar there, and met some ridiculous French guys.

Mercredi, le 14 mars

Histoire de Paris a travers ses monuments – learned more about Louis XIV, and I gave my expose on Saint-Sulpice in the morning. Had break, where we went to the Latin Quarter to get lunch (2 random encounters: (1) running into Sammy on the street, (2) about to cross the street, but then getting run over by Monsieur Peigne (our socially-awkward prof), bundled up in his green winter jacket despite the 65 degree weather, on his bicycle). Walked around Place de la Sorbonne, and then went to the Pantheon. After class, I went back to SB for a while to work & sort out train tickets for the trip to Provence this weekend. Then, when I left Sweet Briar, I had encounter #3 of the weekend, with a friend of Vincent’s, who I’ve met 2x, once at her apartment, and once at the fete. It was more awkward because she (maybe 22) was with her balding (and maybe 45 year old) boyfriend. Again, Paris is a small city.

Came home, dinner with the host fam, did work, and now bed! Bonne nuit!